The Animal Liberation Front, an underground animal rights organisation,
are overjoyed with the early morning blaze at Tegel's processing plant
on Carmen Road, Hornby, Christchurch.

Daryll Cartwright, spokesperson for the Animal Liberation Front, says
"while we do not wish any harm to animals or humans we would like to see
the same destruction at Tegel's two North Island plants. We are
delighted that no more chickens will meet their deaths at the Hornby
plant in the immediate future".

Tegel's growing and production methods are incredibly cruel. Birds are
bred to grow so quickly that their legs often collapse under their
artificially enhanced weight, crippling them. Many die of starvation and
dehydration because their broken legs will not carry them to food and
water. They are crammed by the tens of thousands into sheds thick with
ammonia fumes and forced to spend their entire lives living in their own
waste. The birds routinely suffer broken bones from being grabbed by
their legs and violently stuffed or thrown into crates for transport and
from being slammed into shackles upside-down at slaughterhouses. Many
chickens are still conscious as their throats are slit and when they are
dumped into tanks of scalding hot water to remove their feathers.

The Animal Liberation Front hope that the economic damage to Tegel is
substantial and that the public will think about the conditions and
treatment of the 44,000,000 chickens Tegel slaughter every year.

The Fire Service had previously identified the site as a "danger spot". All officers on duty in Christchurch � about 60 � fought the fire but could not save the Carmen Road factory's 800sq m processing plant.

Firefighters had contained the fire by 6.30am, but continued dampening down all day. Investigators are trying to determine the cause of the fire.

No-one was injured in the blaze as few staff were at the site.

The fire poses difficulties for Tegel, which normally processes about 50,000 chickens a day at the plant for the local market. Its two other factories are in the North Island.

The company last night said it was committed to having a factory in Christchurch, and plans were being made for dealing with the cut in processing. A meeting will be held this morning for the factory's 300 staff.

"At the moment we are focused on staff and customers and how we can help them," a Tegel spokesman said.

"We will be looking at how much is affected and hope to make decisions fairly quickly." The company had contingency plans and hoped to keep disruption to a minimum.

About 80 staff members worked in the burned area. The spokesman said some staff should return to work soon, although they might have to work in other areas or change shift patterns.

Just one truckload of chickens was at the factory when the fire broke out. They were not affected and were returned to a farm, the spokesman said.

Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union district organiser John Kaye said he could not fault Tegel's treatment of staff.

"All the guys want to do is get back to work regardless of where it is, and Tegel is working to help them do that," he said. "Tegel has a very good reputation as an employer and it is trying hard to keep the guys in work."

Fire Service regional commander Rob Saunders said firefighters had previously identified the building as one of the city's danger spots.

It did not have sprinklers and was made of polystyrene sandwich board, a substance that produced a "near-impossible-to-extinguish, running liquid-type fire", he said.

The board was detested by firefighters. "It is extremely rapid-burning and extremely dangerous for internal firefighting. It produces very thick toxic smoke and burns like a flammable liquid," he said.

ECan pollution hotline duty manager Ken Baxter said if Christchurch's regular easterly wind had kicked in while the fire was raging, the toxic fumes could have prompted the mass pre-dawn evacuation of homes nearby.

"Because we had such calm conditions, the smoke plume went virtually straight up," Baxter said.

"They (firefighters) tend to be pretty conservative, and, if they took the step to evacuate, they'd evacuate the whole neighbourhood � maybe 100 to 200 homes."